Howdy folks! 😊

If there’s anything like the ultimate comfort food staple in Sub-Saharan Africa, it would be a meal of Samp. 😋

For the uninitiated, Samp is partially ground up Maize/corn kernels – boiled and eaten almost like rice. Its usually cooked/served with beans, with sour milk and sugar, or even as a decadent ‘pudding’ in groundnut sauce, such as this one. 🤩

The latter is my most favorite way to eat samp – in a rich, creamy, groundnut sauce. Grew up having this dish many times for breakfast in my mother’s kitchen. I still enjoy it to this day, and thought to share my go-to recipe. Try it, and enjoy! 😊

Samp in Groundnut sauce

Recipe by LubayaCourse: MainDifficulty: Medium

Servings

servings

Prep time

minutes

Cooking time

hours

Ingredients

600g Samp
1 cup Brown sugar
2 Teaspoons Salt
2 cups pounded groundnuts
3 Tablespoons smooth peanut butter
Water

Directions

Sort through the Samp for stones and other unwanted matter.
Wash thoroughly in warm running water, a few times through. 😊
After washing, choose a medium sized sauce pan to cook the Samp in.
Because Samp takes so long to cook, it’s often cooked on a charcoal brazier in most households to save power. That, and the smoky flavor that comes with cooking this on a fire 😊. Cook for about 2 hours, adding water to the pot, as it runs out.
Once the Samp is tender, you can transfer the pot to your stove top. We’re now in the home stretch 😊
As the samp continues to cook, get the pounded groundnuts ready. If you have an electric grinder, you can grind up your own dried groundnuts, or like me, you can buy this packet from the store of already pounded groundnuts and make your life easier. 😊
Combine the pounded groundnuts with 1 cup of cold water and mix well, ensuring the paste is smooth, with no lumps. 🙂
Pour the groundnut paste into the Samp and allow this to cook for at least 20 minutes.
As that cooks, combine the peanut butter and brown sugar in a bowl. This is where the Caramely-creaminess will come from 😉. My preferred brand is Freshpikt smooth peanut butter, because from the powerful flavor, you can tell the groundnuts were well toasted and its just a great product for this purpose, really 😊 . Adding the peanut butter and brown sugar really takes this dish deliciously over the top – than if you’d just cooked the samp with the pounded groundnuts. It’s fine…but this is better 😊
Pour some boiling water into the bowl to loosen up the peanut butter, making it a smooth, pouring consistency. Add this to pot and mix well. Cover the pot and allow this to cook on low heat, for 30 minutes. 😊
After 30 minutes, the Samp will thicken up and turn this lovely, caramel brown color🤩🤤. Then you know the dish is ready to eat.
Serve warm, in a bowl when ready to eat. 😊 When left to cool, the ‘pudding’ will stiffen up, though you can loosen it up in the Microwave, with a little warm milk or water. Enjoy! 😋